Heroes Technical Alpha Patch Notes -- July 23, 2014

Blizzard Entertainment
2014-7-23

We've brought the Heroes of the Storm service down for a period of extended maintenance today in order to release a brand new patch for the Technical Alpha. Maintenance is ongoing, but don't worry; we'll let you know as soon as the Nexus is back online! In the meantime, you can check out complete patch notes below.

Please welcome Rehgar, our latest addition to the Heroes of the Storm roster!

Table of Contents:

General

Full Translations Coming Soon

The Heroes of the Storm Technical Alpha game client will soon feature full audio and text translations for languages in both the European and Latin American regions. In the coming days, the following languages will be supported:

Europe

French

German

Italian

Polish

Russian

Spanish

Latin America

Spanish

Portuguese

Be advised that this represents an early pass at audio and text translations for each the languages above. During Tech Alpha testing, players using clients in languages other than English may encounter typos and other translation errors. Please keep in mind that work is ongoing and each language will receive additional polish in the weeks to come.

New Battleground

Garden of Terror, a brand new 3-lane Battleground, has been added to Heroes of the Storm and is now available for play in all matchmaking queues!

After 90 seconds, Night will fall and Horrors will rise within the garden.

Venture into the garden to kill the Horrors and collect the Seeds they drop.

Night will persist until all remaining Horrors have been destroyed.

Collect 100 Seeds and then return to base to take control of a monstrous Garden Terror!

Once unleashed, Garden Terrors can use the following powerful abilities:

Spore Queen’s Curse (Q)

After a short delay, enemy Heroes in the target area are turned into Plant Zombies for 5 seconds.

While in Plant Zombie form, Heroes deal reduced damage, have their Movement Speed reduced by 30%, and become silenced.

Plant Horror Overgrowth (W)

Disables and damages all enemy structures within a large area as long as the Horror Overgrowth remains alive.

Rehgar Earthfury, Shaman of the Earthen Ring, has been added to Heroes of the Storm and is now available for play! Read on for a brief overview of his abilities, and check out Rehgar's Hero Week blog for much more information on this powerful new Support Hero.

Abilities:

Chain Heal (Q)

Creates a healing wave that jumps between allies.

Lightning Shield (W)

Imbue target ally with lightning, causing damage to nearby enemies.

Earthbind Totem (E)

Spawns a totem that slows nearby enemies.

Trait:

Ghost Wolf (Z)

Instead of using a mount, Rehgar transforms into a Ghost Wolf, increasing his movement speed.

Heroic Abilities

Bloodlust (R)

Stir allies into a frenzy, increasing their Attack and Movement Speeds.

Master Skins have been added for the following 16 Heroes, and many more will be added in the weeks to come:

Abathur

Arthas

Diablo

Falstad

Illidan

Kerrigan

Li Li

Muradin

Rehgar

Sonya

Stitches

Tassadar

Tyrande

Uther

Valla

Zagara

Bundle Packs

The Ironclaw Rehgar Bundle has been made available in the Shop for a limited time.

All previously available Bundle Packs have been removed from the Shop, and replaced by the following:

Assassin Bundle

Warrior Bundle

Support Bundle

Beatdown Bundle

Heavy Hitters Bundle

Heroes of the Light Bundle

Please note: With the exception of the Ironclaw Rehgar Bundle, each of the Bundles added today feature a selection of three Heroes, from a combined total of nine, packaged in different ways so that you can purchase the Bundle that best fits your preferred playstyle.

Bug Fixes

Abilities that function based on Charges no longer sometimes place the Hero behind enemy Structures.

Fixed many issues which caused splat graphics to display incorrectly on the game world, especially over cliffs and low height terrain.

Fixed an issue that could cause custom graphics settings to automatically revert to the selected Shader setting upon entering a match.

Battleground load screens will no longer hang if Heroes of the Storm is Alt + Tabbed when the loading screen first appears.

Art

Graphic effects surrounding Zeratul's Psi-Blade on the Hero Select screen no longer appear misaligned while searching for a match.

Tyrande now loads her bow at an angle that is more consistent with the flight path of her Basic Attacks.

User Interface

Highlighting an item in the Shop will no longer cause mouse wheel scrolling to skip pages.

Fixed an issue that could cause Hero Abilities to cast unintentionally while typing in chat with the Quick Cast option set to "On Release".

Battlegrounds

Treasure Chests on Blackheart’s Bay no longer visibly persist through the Fog of War, nor on the minimap, after they are destroyed.

Heroes and Talents

Abathur's Symbiote overhead graphic effect is no longer visible through Line of Sight blockers. Abathur’s Symbiote abilities can no longer continue to be cast when a Hero under the effects of Symbiote becomes trapped by Zagara’s Devouring Maw Heroic Ability.

Brightwing's Polymorph ability no longer occasionally causes the target to become invisible.